Spider
by Forgotten Muse
Summary: Ever held a life in your hands? A certain individual's thoughts on life, the universe and... arachnophobia? Fleetway universe.


AUTHOR: Thalia Evans

RATING: G 

DISCLAIMER: All the characters are © to their respective owners. (Sega/Egmont Fleetway/) Don't sue me. Student. Skint.

SPOILERS: No.

PAIRINGS:  Nope, none whatsoever

SUMMARY: An individual's thoughts on life, the universe and… arachnophobia?

WARNINGS: No…. (boring, isn't it)

TIMELINE: Somewhere between STC 100 and 184, but don't ask me where…

Spider

Sonic the Comic fan fiction by T. Evans

A/N Blah. Random weird ficlet/drabble thing. Shouldn't even really be in first person, makes the whole thing very out of character…. But what the heck, wrote it anyway. *shrug*

Characters belong to Sega or Egmont Fleetway, but whoever owns them it definitely isn't me.

* * * *

  Ever held a life in your hands?

I have… too many times to count.

A dangerous criminal, an innocent bystander, some stranger from the street… whoever it is, it always comes down to one simple choice: do you save or abandon? Preserve or destroy? 

Sometimes the choice is a hard one to make.

 I have even held Sonic's life in the balance. More than once…

More than once, I've made the choice and it has been taken from me at the last moment. Then it made me angry. Furious. Now… now I'm glad the final decision wasn't mine.

  My perspective has changed since then. I know I would have taken the wrong option if I was allowed to.

 I face that choice again now, and this time I know the decision is mine, and mine alone- it's just a spider, a little black blob on stilt legs scrabbling desperately at the smooth white sides of the bathroom sink. It is trapped and helpless in a huge porcelain prison. Still, insignificant as the little creature is, its' fate is under my control.

  I could fish it out… Or I could turn on the tap and walk away.

 I know what my initial thought is telling me to do… I hate spiders. Really hate them… even this bedraggled little specimen gives me a sick feeling that makes me want to back off, get as far away from it as possible. My face scrunches into a grimace at the twitching hairy legs- ugh. The thing can't be more than a centimetre across, but somehow it seems much bigger…

 I reach for the hot water tap, grasping the chrome handle… but for some reason I don't twist it. I pause for a moment.

  Frowning, my eyes flick to the struggling arachnid.

Now, Sonic… he wouldn't have hesitated for a moment. He would have flushed the spider away without a thought; so why should I be any different?

  It's only a spider. And I'm not Sonic.

 Somehow, I feel sorry for the creature. Am I about to unleash a torrent of scalding water on this tiny, unsuspecting animal? It's a small life but I'd still be ending it.

 This spider… it might be repulsive to me, but really it's just another being locked in a struggle for survival. A loathed and misunderstood creature, spending its existence hiding in the shadows for fear of being crushed by people… people like me, and like Sonic, who don't understand. People who only know the horror stories about needle-like fangs and deadly bites, and don't realise that this particular spider has no venom and never meant any harm to anyone.

  I expect a lot of people would try to destroy me without a thought, too.

 I come to realise that I have a lot in common with the spider. And if I deserve to live, then so does it.

 Besides, if I killed the hapless little creature, what would that make me? It would mean I hadn't changed at all.

  And it would give me yet another thing in common with Sonic.

I don't want either.

 Why am I frightened of something as small and helpless as a little spider, anyway? It's irrational. It's ridiculous.

  I take my hand off the tap, reaching into the sink instead; I still can't help but wince as it climbs almost gratefully onto my finger. But I can't feel the movement of the legs at all through my glove, and the spider is so small it seems to have no weight at all. Maybe it's not so bad after all…

  I look at it closely. As I watch, it crawls to the tip of my finger and hangs there by a shining silver thread. 

The creature has no idea how close to death it came, and I can't help but feel guilty for considering killing it… it is covered in a soft, downy fur and marbled with a subtle and intricate swirling pattern of black and red-brown that I hadn't noticed before. The slender legs are almost graceful.

  The spider is tiny and delicate, and actually quite pretty.

Did I make the right choice? I think so.

Everything deserves a chance.

~

   "What have you got there?"

He paused and distractedly looked up from his hands.

  "Oh… hi, Ebony…" he raised his arm to show the black speck scampering from the palm to the back of his hand. "A spider," he explained. "Fished it out of the sink." Eyes turned to the arachnid again, red shifting and focusing. "Sonic is scared of these things, you know. Stupid, isn't it?" A grin.

  She chuckled and shook her head amusedly as the yellow hedgehog walked away.

~end

* * * *

Hum, I dunno where that came from….

--Thalia


End file.
